News

Amazon buys an ‘Internet of things’ technology company

March 13, 2015 03:38 PM

Amazon.com Inc., the No. 1 retailer in the Internet Retailer 2014 Top 500 Guide, has bought 2lemetry, a 4-year-old Denver company whose technology helps power the so-called Internet of things, a phrase to describe web-connected refrigerators, cars, consumer goods and other products.

Neither company disclosed terms.

“We can confirm that Amazon has acquired 2lemetry, and we look forward to continuing to support 2lemetry customers,” said a spokeswoman for Amazon Web Services, the e-retailer’s web-hosted computing arm for companies, government agencies and other organizations. She declined to offer details. 2lemetry customers include Honeywell International Inc., which sells commercial and consumer goods, engineering services and other products; Shenzhen Rakwireless Technology Co. Ltd, which sells Wi-Fi terminals along with cloud computing services in China; and Demeter Power Group, which sells solar power gear.

Since its 2011 launch, 2lemetry has raised some $9 million, including $4 million in a funding round in January that included Salesforce Ventures and several private investors. 2lemetry’s technology helps connect devices and handle the data coming from them, among other tasks.

Last year, another giant in e-commerce, Google Inc., paid $3.2 billion for Nest Labs Inc., a seller of web-connected smoke alarms and thermostats that was co-founded by Apple Inc. executive Tony Fadell, widely regarded as one of the executives who birthed the iPod.